Wednesday, May 28, 2014

M5.8 earthquake Dominican Republic

This is a fine earthquake on the lower fault of the northern boundary. Normally, this is all strike-slip, but this one seems to be compression.

So, I have no idea, but it may be the sort of mechanism that destroyed Haiti. I never did check what that was. The earthquake may have a higher PGV for its size, but looks like nobody is around there. Makes the earthquake much more of an academic thing.

The zone between the two faults should be under shear stress, since history has shown that earthquakes on the bottom are followed by the top. Very weird to have such a double zone.